The only one I'm surprised wasn't included was The Ring, in either Japanese or American form (I don't think I missed it). The American one in particular seems to hold up pretty well when I re-watched it this year, its popularization of the "possessed all-white little girl" trope makes it super influential.
Also, maybe it's just the 6th grade boy still buried deep inside of me, but watching the "cursed video tape" by itself never fails to give me the creeps.
I'm not a huge fan of that era of J-horror (Kiyoshi Kurosawa aside), would side with the general consensus that the US version is the better of the two. Both versions just fall a bit flat for me, despite a few effective shocks, but I generally find the mid to late '90s to be one of the worst periods for horror in general--kind of this weird zone where the campy but visceral practical effects gore of the '70s and '80s has been largely replaced with extremely crummy CGI, and the more self-serious entries in the genre lack the panache that we get with the arthouse horror of the late '00s to the present.
Kiss of the Damned: Films made by Cassavetes' progeny cannot be further away from his own work. Both lead actresses in this film are very attractive. The blue eyed brunette also has a part in a very good film with isabelle huppert and oliver martinez.
Pulse: It really is better than the ranking you gave it. Very strange film.
The Witch: I disagree with you: I think it is a pretentious and mediocre film.
Roar: this film couldn't be made today and this is the fault of political correctness.
Evil Dead: evil dead is arty. but what about army of darkness, it should be on the list too.
The Exorcist friedkin was a peerless filmmaker and he proved that not with the exorcist but with the film that also ended his career, sorcerer.
IT: the original was better.
Raw: the scariest parts were the hazing episodes in the university. this film really shows you what it takes to be a veterinarian. does that make sense because I think that's what the film is really about.
wes craven's new nightmare should also be on the list.
I'll hear the argument for Evil Dead being arty on the strength of how idiosyncratic its camerawork is, but what I'm usually aiming for there is a measure of whether the filmmakers seem to be aiming principally for "entertainment"; the tasting notes are a bit inconsistent, but they can hopefully help people decide whether a particular film's what they're in the mood for. I never cared for Army of Darkness; it has some very funny moments, but I find it kind of tedious, and the wackiness misses the mark for me.
Excellent take on Raw, I'm with it.
I rewatched New Nightmare a few years ago, but it didn't grip me. It has a lot of the same problems as Scream, another Craven movie I don't care for, in that I feel like the movie is smirking at me waiting for me to notice its clever premise, but there isn't a lot there once you get past it. The meta concept was very ahead of its time, but it has been done better since, and I have also become incredibly tired of it because of how unbearably self-referential contemporary culture has become. That's not New Nightmare's fault, and it deserves some credit for bringing the trope to the mainstream, but feh, not for me.
Thanks for reading the list, and for additional fuel to finally get round to rewatching Pulse (and maybe a few other Kurosawas).
evil dead is "arty" in the way that "the thing" is also "arty": these films are "artistic" in their pureness, effectiveness and sharpness. they are "artistic" because of their full, serious and intelligent modernity. in fact they are "poetic". they have a cold, icy flame burning in their core as all "modern" works of art.
you probably know but heather langenkamp is actually married to a special effects guy and years after making new nightmare lost her young son to sickness. what has that anything to do with the film, you might reasonably ask. well, can I give you another example: mahler lost his daughter after writing kindertotenlieder and said that he could've never composed those songs after losing a child. does a real life event retroactively change the meaning of the work? but new nightmare is about the absolute and essential unity of life and art.
I don't see "horror" films as links in an endless chain of reference. I see them as autonomous works of fiction related to other works like all films. but I am a regular person and not a film scholar. so maybe that is the source of my error.
I disagree about scream too. I think we disagree about craven fundamentally. for me craven is a serious filmmaker and not a trickster. he got stuck with horror genre because of hollywood's perversity but he always had things to say and he tried to express them in that particular genre's limits.
Perhaps a better framing would be: I take "arty" to refer to an affect, rather than whether a film is or is not "art" / artistic etc. Few would mistake The Thing for an arthouse film, though I would agree it is a superior piece of art to any number of tedious Godard or Fellini knockoffs. You can watch it while being attentive to its poetry, or you can watch it to see grotesque special effects and a guy with a cool flamethrower. The same is not as true of something like Antichrist or Vampyr, which largely eschew the pacing of film-as-entertainment medium (even as they refer to some of its standard conventions). As the rankings (which are themselves very arbitrary and silly) indicate, the "arty?" column doesn't strongly correlate with my enjoyment of a film or assessment of its quality. I'm more of a "poptimist" than my colleague Eris; a lot of great stuff has emerged from the commercial film industry, but it sort of definitionally easier to eat popcorn while watching than the more overtly avant-garde stuff.
Re: Craven, I have respect for his work and influence, but I probably enjoy him the least of the directors of his "tier" in the genre. He is more ambitious (or at least overt) in terms of wanting his films to be "about" something than some of his peers, but I think that can rob some of them of their force. I also don't always line up with his sense of humour.
what I get from your definition is that a movie can be "arty" only in an ironic or an essentially false manner. it can pretend to be artistic just to prove how silly such a thing is or it can use artiness to cover over its defects. I agree with you, it is used as a distinct style especially in the horror or science fiction genre. but doesn't that show an important error, a lack of something in the work? many fashionable "art" films of the last few years are "arty" in that sense, like eggers' films. I think those films doesn't have any substance and everything they have is essentially just decor. I am glad you didn't include substance or nosferatu in your list. some niche genres like body horror are now being talked about as if belonging to them confers a unique value to any film. what I really think that should be included is "misery" but maybe you think of that film more as a bdsm fantasy than a horror story.
I have donned the armor of God (slept five hours) and I am here to fight you in the comments.
I cannot believe you did all 100 wtf is wrong with you lmao
God forbid a man share some opinions.
The only one I'm surprised wasn't included was The Ring, in either Japanese or American form (I don't think I missed it). The American one in particular seems to hold up pretty well when I re-watched it this year, its popularization of the "possessed all-white little girl" trope makes it super influential.
Also, maybe it's just the 6th grade boy still buried deep inside of me, but watching the "cursed video tape" by itself never fails to give me the creeps.
I'm not a huge fan of that era of J-horror (Kiyoshi Kurosawa aside), would side with the general consensus that the US version is the better of the two. Both versions just fall a bit flat for me, despite a few effective shocks, but I generally find the mid to late '90s to be one of the worst periods for horror in general--kind of this weird zone where the campy but visceral practical effects gore of the '70s and '80s has been largely replaced with extremely crummy CGI, and the more self-serious entries in the genre lack the panache that we get with the arthouse horror of the late '00s to the present.
Pontypool neighboring Onibaba made me smile
Repeating the word ONIBABA over and over again until I descend into a mindless rage.
Kiss of the Damned: Films made by Cassavetes' progeny cannot be further away from his own work. Both lead actresses in this film are very attractive. The blue eyed brunette also has a part in a very good film with isabelle huppert and oliver martinez.
Pulse: It really is better than the ranking you gave it. Very strange film.
The Witch: I disagree with you: I think it is a pretentious and mediocre film.
Roar: this film couldn't be made today and this is the fault of political correctness.
Evil Dead: evil dead is arty. but what about army of darkness, it should be on the list too.
The Exorcist friedkin was a peerless filmmaker and he proved that not with the exorcist but with the film that also ended his career, sorcerer.
IT: the original was better.
Raw: the scariest parts were the hazing episodes in the university. this film really shows you what it takes to be a veterinarian. does that make sense because I think that's what the film is really about.
wes craven's new nightmare should also be on the list.
I'll hear the argument for Evil Dead being arty on the strength of how idiosyncratic its camerawork is, but what I'm usually aiming for there is a measure of whether the filmmakers seem to be aiming principally for "entertainment"; the tasting notes are a bit inconsistent, but they can hopefully help people decide whether a particular film's what they're in the mood for. I never cared for Army of Darkness; it has some very funny moments, but I find it kind of tedious, and the wackiness misses the mark for me.
Excellent take on Raw, I'm with it.
I rewatched New Nightmare a few years ago, but it didn't grip me. It has a lot of the same problems as Scream, another Craven movie I don't care for, in that I feel like the movie is smirking at me waiting for me to notice its clever premise, but there isn't a lot there once you get past it. The meta concept was very ahead of its time, but it has been done better since, and I have also become incredibly tired of it because of how unbearably self-referential contemporary culture has become. That's not New Nightmare's fault, and it deserves some credit for bringing the trope to the mainstream, but feh, not for me.
Thanks for reading the list, and for additional fuel to finally get round to rewatching Pulse (and maybe a few other Kurosawas).
evil dead is "arty" in the way that "the thing" is also "arty": these films are "artistic" in their pureness, effectiveness and sharpness. they are "artistic" because of their full, serious and intelligent modernity. in fact they are "poetic". they have a cold, icy flame burning in their core as all "modern" works of art.
you probably know but heather langenkamp is actually married to a special effects guy and years after making new nightmare lost her young son to sickness. what has that anything to do with the film, you might reasonably ask. well, can I give you another example: mahler lost his daughter after writing kindertotenlieder and said that he could've never composed those songs after losing a child. does a real life event retroactively change the meaning of the work? but new nightmare is about the absolute and essential unity of life and art.
I don't see "horror" films as links in an endless chain of reference. I see them as autonomous works of fiction related to other works like all films. but I am a regular person and not a film scholar. so maybe that is the source of my error.
I disagree about scream too. I think we disagree about craven fundamentally. for me craven is a serious filmmaker and not a trickster. he got stuck with horror genre because of hollywood's perversity but he always had things to say and he tried to express them in that particular genre's limits.
Perhaps a better framing would be: I take "arty" to refer to an affect, rather than whether a film is or is not "art" / artistic etc. Few would mistake The Thing for an arthouse film, though I would agree it is a superior piece of art to any number of tedious Godard or Fellini knockoffs. You can watch it while being attentive to its poetry, or you can watch it to see grotesque special effects and a guy with a cool flamethrower. The same is not as true of something like Antichrist or Vampyr, which largely eschew the pacing of film-as-entertainment medium (even as they refer to some of its standard conventions). As the rankings (which are themselves very arbitrary and silly) indicate, the "arty?" column doesn't strongly correlate with my enjoyment of a film or assessment of its quality. I'm more of a "poptimist" than my colleague Eris; a lot of great stuff has emerged from the commercial film industry, but it sort of definitionally easier to eat popcorn while watching than the more overtly avant-garde stuff.
Re: Craven, I have respect for his work and influence, but I probably enjoy him the least of the directors of his "tier" in the genre. He is more ambitious (or at least overt) in terms of wanting his films to be "about" something than some of his peers, but I think that can rob some of them of their force. I also don't always line up with his sense of humour.
what I get from your definition is that a movie can be "arty" only in an ironic or an essentially false manner. it can pretend to be artistic just to prove how silly such a thing is or it can use artiness to cover over its defects. I agree with you, it is used as a distinct style especially in the horror or science fiction genre. but doesn't that show an important error, a lack of something in the work? many fashionable "art" films of the last few years are "arty" in that sense, like eggers' films. I think those films doesn't have any substance and everything they have is essentially just decor. I am glad you didn't include substance or nosferatu in your list. some niche genres like body horror are now being talked about as if belonging to them confers a unique value to any film. what I really think that should be included is "misery" but maybe you think of that film more as a bdsm fantasy than a horror story.